


Click, Click, Boom

by Night-Mare (Aoife)



Series: Cradle 'verse [23]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Author loves to chat in the Comments, Flame Active Character(s), Gen, Side Story, Unconventional Uses for Dying Will Flames
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 10:19:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12166962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoife/pseuds/Night-Mare
Summary: Part of theCradle 'verse. Spanner's Acquisition.





	Click, Click, Boom

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Rules the World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10607250) by [Night-Mare (Aoife)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoife/pseuds/Night-Mare). 



He shivers and curls up into a tighter ball.

The Moscas had just been him experimenting, trying to figure out how to build a better robot, and his grandfather had indulged him; they’d both been grieving. But then two of his robots vanished. And a third, and he’d confronted his grandfather about it, but he’d pushed him off, told him not to worry.

Then he’d woken up groggy, with a headache, and he’s in a strange room. It’s walls are made of cinderblock, and he’s on a thin mattress on a rickety bunk bed. He shivers and wraps the thin blanket around himself more tightly.

It’s not as bad as it could be. He earns heating in his room quickly, and there’s a whole workshop he gets free run of. It’s really well equipped, and he can almost forget that he’s a prisoner, that his keepers taunt him with the fact his grandfather had sold him to them.

Things stay like that for a while. He marks off the times he goes to the workshop, but he’s not convinced that they’re keeping him on a twenty-four hour sleep-cycle, so he has no idea how long he’s been here, not really. But they pile on the pressure, and he slips, doesn’t meet the deadlines they set, and they get aggressive, slap, and hit and threaten him. And then there’s a large pill on his food tray, and it makes him uneasy. He doesn’t take it.

It reappears at the next meal, and the next, and the next. He keeps ignoring it, and ignoring it. Then it stops appearing, and a pile of mechanical blueprints that he can’t make head or tales of get dumped in his room, and he stops being allowed out, into his workshop, and the food reduces, and reduces and it’s cold again. He finds himself sleeping curled up in a tight and tighter ball trying to stay warm, but he’s tired and losing weight.

He wakes up flailing with the pill in his mouth, thrashing against the adult with their hand over his mouth. It dissolves on his tongue, and he feels dizzy and he's on fire. Green fire that crackles and sparks, and spreads over his skin. It stuns the man touching him, and the one who tries to stop him fleeing, and he runs. Runs as fast as he can, and he keeps running until he drops, exhausted. He's cold and he's shivering and he's terrified when the other boys find him. The five boys spread out, two of them guarding the entrance, and three of them approaching him, and he scrambles backwards until his back’s against the alley wall. The one with bright orange eyes and dark auburn hair kneels next to him, and touches him gently, fingers brushing against his.

The green fire roil, outraged at the touch, but then there's orange fire meeting it and oh, it’s like he's finally _home_. Finally home and safe for the first time since he buried his mother and his grandfather betrayed him. He’s warm, and his heart stops racing. "This wasn't how I expected you to find a Lightning, Tsu-kun." The words came from the other boy who’s kneeling by his side, dark blue fire covering his hands, and he twitches, but allows them to flow over his body. "Mmmm. Kyo-kun, he's almost tapped out his Flames; have you mastered propagating someone else's Flames?" The taller, darker haired boy wearing what looked like a uniform snarled at the one kneeling by him, and the one with the dark blue fire was on his feet suddenly, and had a trident in his hand.

"Kyoya, Mukuro, there are more appropriate times and places to spar with each other. And there's likely herbivores to be disciplined and mafioso to toy with." The orange eyed boy petted his hair affectionately. "So. You're mine now, my Lightning; what's your name?" The claim should disturb him, but instead it makes the green fire curl in pleasure and delight.

"Spanner." He's not going to claim his given or family name. Not after his own family sold him. The orange eyed boy was still touching him, the orange fire, warming him.

"Kyoya, can you propagate my new Lightning's Flames?" The uniformed teen kneels beside him, and his hands catch fire - with purple fire - that then presses into his side, and there's green fire dancing over his skin again. "Mukuro, you're going to need to help Spanner-kun control his Flames until we're back within Dino-nii’s compound." The dark blue fire net that settles over him makes the green fire sink back beneath his skin; it makes his skin feel two sizes too small, but the orange eyed teen - the one that had been called Tsu-kun by one of the others - helps him to his feet before he can say anything.

The silver-haired boy at the mouth of the alley whistles a warning. Dark blue fire spreads over all six of them, and he's startled to watch boys his own age shift from relatively relaxed to ready to fight. Really ready to fight. There's multi-coloured fire licking across all of their hands, and the weapons in the other boys hands and the weapons are a completely mixed bag. There's batons and the trident, and glowing bracelets; there's a sword, and _dynamite_?!

He doesn't follow what happens next too well; there's an adult in the alley entrance, and the silver haired boy is beside him, throwing sticks of dynamite and the uniformed teen and his orange-eyed rescuer are in the air; the trident-wielder slams it’s base into the ground, and then the world shifts and distorts and he's not sure he can believe anything he sees after that. Not with demons, tentacles, multi-coloured fire and mythical creatures _everywhere_.

(He wakes up safe, but exhausted, in a pile of bodies that include his rescuers; several of whom look _very_ beaten up, but they’re all still alive. There’s a brunette woman with the dark blue fire watching over them all, singing a soft lullaby to two babies in a bassinet, and he drifts off back to sleep again feeling strangely content and at ease for the first time in a very long time.)


End file.
